


But Not With Haste

by electricchicken



Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: F/M, M/M, pre-game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-23
Updated: 2012-10-23
Packaged: 2017-11-16 21:41:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/544127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electricchicken/pseuds/electricchicken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack and Eugene settle in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	But Not With Haste

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> Written for the Zombies, Write fic exchange for fairytalesandfoolishness/meganrolling, who wanted some pre-game normalcy with the Radio Boyfriends. Well, normal for Jack and Eugene...

**HOSPITAL**

Something's tickling his face, and Jack wrestles his eyes open because that's easier than raising a hand to swat it away. It's been a long week. Moving is something he'll attempt when sleep starts coming in more than three hour stretches, and the sounds of strangers vomiting somewhere in the darkness don't keep him up half the night.

He has to blink a few times before Eugene slides into focus. He's frowning, eyebrows drawn together, and Jack's vision blurs again momentarily as he reaches over and runs a finger along the bridge of his nose. "You've got a bump here."

That explains the tickling, then. Sort of. Jack tries to fight the urge to scrunch his face up and pull back. "Good morning to you too."

Eugene nods, still stone faced, and keeps tracing along Jack's face. Down over his chin, up one cheek, along an eyebrow. Maybe it's the morphine — or whatever it is Dr. Myers has him shot full of — but Eugene's been in this very strange, quasi-zen place pretty much since he woke up after surgery and it's starting to weird Jack out, just a little. The face touching is not helping matters so much.

"You having fun over there?" it takes a couple attempts to get his arm to lift and his hand around Eugene's wrist, but at least it stops the tickling. 

"I like your face," Eugene says, still deadly serious, and pokes him on the forehead with the hand Jack hadn't thought to capture when he'd gone after the first.

He actually feels a little bad for laughing at that, but _come on_. "Someone's already had their painkiller breakfast, I see?"

"Mm," Eugene bobs his head and doesn't protest when Jack traps both his hands between them, knitting their fingers together and pressing them to his chest. Just slides forward slightly instead, until he's close enough to skim his mouth across Jack's. "Good morning."

"I like your face too," Jack says, because what the hell, and kisses him back.

**ARMOURY**

Privacy's not the easiest thing to come by at Abel, but for some reason this particular bunch of zombie survivors seems to have an aversion to hanging out in poorly lit rooms with large stores of ammo. Might be the blood smell, or the stains on the armoury floor. Of all the parts of the compound, this looks as though it's seen more action than most and Jack would bet W.G. that plenty of it wasn't pretty.

But it's pretty clear Dr. Myers wants them out of the hospital as soon as possible, if not sooner, and since Eugene reacts not at all well to being pushed around in a wheelbarrow they need to practice this. If that means spending more time around live rounds and pieces of shotguns than he'd like, so be it.

Eugene lifts one crutch maybe half an inch off the ground, then sets it back down so fast the rubber bit on the bottom bounces off the concrete floor. He's gripping them tight, knuckles going from red to white, and Jack thinks he can see his arms shaking.

"You're doing fine," he says, and Eugene turns the glare he's been shooting the floor on him instead. "No, seriously, you are. Just try it again."

The crutch goes back up, comes down a little ways ahead of Eugene's position. "This is more complicated than it should be."

"Yeah, but think about the long term benefits," Jack says, putting a hand out just in case as Eugene moves the other crutch forward, then manages an awkward, unsteady sort of hop foward. "You're going to have like, the hottest leg ever once you build up the muscle. If they had bodybuilding competitions where you only got to compete with one limb, your leg would totally win them."

"I've been letting you follow me around for too long, because that was almost comforting," both crutches go up this time, and Jack catches him by the shoulders just before he goes toppling face first into the floor. "Fuck, sorry."

"Aw, I'm rubbing off on you," Jack says, and can't quite help the snicker that escapes with that.

"Not ever again, after that joke," Eugene mutters, easing away to put his weight back on the crutches.

**HOUSING**

The shower situation at Abel is not actually as bad as Jack was expecting, in that there is a shower situation at all. If he'd thought about it much — okay, at all — he would have assumed everyone was bathing out of buckets. Or just... not.

Instead, there's a tiny, roofless tin shack, set inside a slightly larger fenced space. Not exactly all the mod cons, but Eugene's staring at it like it's the most brilliant thing he's ever seen.

"Little help here?" he gestures down at his clothes and for once he doesn't look like he's hating himself for asking. Quite the opposite, really. Jack's missed that smile.

"Getting you naked? Always," he flashes the biggest, cheesiest grin he's got, and doesn't miss the little flicker of heat in Eugene's expression, even as he's pulling a face.

Course, anything that might be hot about the situation fizzles a few seconds later, when they go tumbling into a wall, trying to get his shirt off. In the end, it's easier for Jack to hold him up while Eugene shrugs out of it himself. Which has the added benefit of leaving him with an armful of shirtless boyfriend and — wait, did he say this wasn't hot? Taking that back, right now.

He waits until Eugene's got a good grip on the crutches again before starting in on the zip of his trousers. And maybe it's laying it on a bit thick, when he sinks to his knees as he pushes them down, but the way Eugene chokes on his own breath at it is priceless. Also, seriously, how else is he supposed to get his shoe untied?

He shucks out of his own clothes as fast as he can, and it still seems to take forever. By the time he's done, Eugene is watching him with dark eyes and this little smirk that makes Jack go a bit weak in the knees. It's really a miracle no one goes over again, when they crush up against each other. Jack isn't even sure how Eugene's staying upright at all, because his hands sure as hell aren't on the crutches just now.

"We should," Eugene starts, then seems to loose the thread of whatever he's saying in favour of gripping at Jack's ass. "We only get fifteen minutes."

He's right, and it's not like they don't have their own semi-private sleeping quarters to finish up in later, but it takes more willpower than Jack's used in ages to pull back and disentangle himself and drag open the door to the shower cubicle. He makes it up to himself by plastering along Eugene's back once they're inside, and they both shudder with it.

"Later, later okay?" Eugene murmurs, even as he's grinding back against him and craning his head around in search of Jack's mouth. There's a little pull cord in one corner to start the water and Jack watches him reach for it blind.

He hears a low, metal thumping sound, a faint hiss, and then a surprisingly strong stream of water starts pouring from the faucet overhead. All of which would be great, except—

"Oh, Jesus, that's freezing," he turns his head away, trying to deflect some of the drops of ice cold liquid spraying at his face and Eugene lets out a sharp, surprised laugh and scrabbles for the cord again.

The water trickles to a thin stream, and while Jack's missed the worst of it poor Eugene is just drenched and shivering for altogether different reasons this time. "I feel like we should have seen this coming."

" _Now_ do I get to warm you up?"

Eugene laughs, and shrugs him off to hobble over to the side of the cubicle. Jack doesn't suspect a thing, until the first blast of cold hits him straight in the chest.

**FOOD**

"I don't understand what this is," Eugene says, sadly, poking his fork into the tin on the table before him.

"Whoever's doing the shopping here really needs to start making a list," Jack agrees, staring down into his own tin. Eating at Abel is`the dietary equivalent of Russian Roulette, only with more bullets in the gun. "Water chestnut?"

"Seriously?" he glances over, and Jack tilts his can for him to see. "That's the saddest thing I've ever seen. Have a... a chunk of mystery meat in red sauce, so you don't starve."

"You got mackerel? Not fair," he snags a bite and, ah, yeah. Much better than crunchy bits of white that don't even taste of anything. "Since when are you a picky eater anyway? Don't you fancy food writers eat all kinds of shite? Like, bones and cow tails and gourds and things."

"Bone marrow, not actual bones, genius. And I wouldn't eat that out of a tin, either." Eugene shoves his breakfast over and Jack wrestles with the guilt for all of two seconds before digging in, though he does make a sort of 'go ahead' motion at the chestnuts. Eugene eats one without much enthusiasm. "You know what I miss?"

"If this is where you start reminiscing fond about eating pigeons, I'm breaking up with you," Jack says. "I don't care how much you think it tasted like chicken, it was weird. It was always weird."

Eugene snorts and shoves at him. "Would you have preferred water chestnuts?"

"Now, see, that's not a fair comparison," he mumbles around a mouthful of fish, scraping at the corners of the tin for the last bits of sauce. "No one ever prefers water chestnuts."

**COMMUNICATIONS**

Alice spares a wave in their direction as she jogs around them, pulling her headset free and doubling her pace as the comms shack draws nearer.

"Someone ought to tell them," Jack says, absently. "Watch that rock, Gene."

Eugene executes a wobbly sidestep around the obstacle, and nods to himself. Little victories. Jack gets it. "What do you want to tell them, exactly?"

"I didn't say it should be me," he protests, shoving his hands into his pockets to keep from putting an arm out when Eugene sets a crutch down a bit funny. "Could be anyone really. You, the doctor, another runner, Janine—"

"Hah."

"Okay, probably not Janine," Jack allows. The world may be a strange place these days, what with dead people prowling the countryside and all, but some things are still impossible. "But someone ought to say something, don't you think? It's not like it isn't obvious that they fancy each other — I mean, you noticed straight away, and you were still so high you kept asking me when I'd gotten a twin."

"And you can stop bringing that up any time you want," Eugene says, jabbing at him with a crutch and missing. The end comes closer to his leg than last time, though, and if he ever gets that move down Jack really is going to have to talk to the major about abuse. "You really think they don't know?"

"Well, Alice probably knows." He's rather fond of Runner 5, he'll admit. For a girl with a military background, she's got more spark to her than you'd expect. She's already taught him at least a half dozen new dirty jokes he's saving for an opportune moment. "But I'm not clear on whether Sam's noticed _he's_ interested in her."

"Kids today," Eugene agrees with a shake of his head, and Jack really wishes sometimes that it were still okay to shove him when he's not sitting down.

Across the yard, Alice pauses in front of the shack, taking a moment to smooth back the wispy bits of her ponytail before throwing the door open with a bang Jack can hear from all the way back in the quad.

"If I were her, I'd just snog him and be done with it," Jack decides.

"You think a lot about kissing Sam?" Eugene asks.

"Oh, all the time. Actually, if you don't think Alice would shoot us both, I was thinking we should ask him to join us some—"

This time he has to jump to the side to avoid the crutch that swipes at his ankle. And oh, it's _on_. He tackles Eugene around the waist and lifts, and it's a miracle no one gets brained with a crutch when they go down in a laughing, shoving heap.

"You are insane," Eugene gasps out, as Jack rolls them over and presses him down into the dirt.

"Just noticing now, are we?" he grins and Eugene rolls his eyes, and like anyone could blame him for needing to steal a kiss, just now. Or maybe two. Yeah, two seems like a good number.

"Get a room," Alice calls, and Jack looks up to see her walking back towards them, Sam at her side.

"You too," Eugene shouts back, before giving Jack a mighty shove off him. And he may end up with a mouthful of dirt as a result, but this is one of those times when Jack remembers exactly why he's mad about this man.

**RECREATION**

"Hey, look," Eugene says under his breath, nudging Jack's shoulder with his own. Around them the room is wall-to-wall bodies. Probably the whole population of the township's in here, curled up in blankets and sleeping bags or on the few precious, ratty couches at the back. The sheet hanging on the facing wall isn't a perfect theatre screen or anything, but it holds the picture from the old projector Runner 12's scrounged up well enough. Not like digital display is the highest priority these days.

Jack glances around the darkened space, trying to pick out faces in the dim, flickering light of the film.

"In the corner," Eugene whispers, leaning in close enough that warm breath tickles at Jack's ear and makes him burrow closer in their shared sleeping bag.

When he looks again, he sees them almost immediately. Sam and Alice have a blanket draped across their shoulders and are sharing a jar of what look to be pickled jalapenos. And the light is really bad, but you'd have to be blind to miss how close they're sitting, or how big Sam's smile is.

"God that's precious," he mutters back.

"And no one takes a corner like that unless they're planning on making out," Eugene says with a sly smile.

"Speaking of, what are we doing all the way over here in the middle of the room?" Jack grumbles. It's not fair of him to metion things like that when they're surrounded by a half dozen children and probably in Janine's direct line of sight.

"Just watch the movie."

"Spoilsport." Up on the screen, the film's two male leads seem to be attempting a jailbreak from a large ship. It's weird. Maybe a sliver of western cinema's survived the outbreak, and they've somehow managed to dredge up kids' film about the conquest of the Aztecs. Not the most upbeat of all subjects, but it had been either that or _Bambi_ , and no one here is stupid enough to think that would have ended well.

They watch in silence after that for a while. Eugene slips an arm around Jack's shoulders, and it's all so weirdly normal, in a way that wouldn't have shocked him six months ago and that he couldn't have imagined five weeks back. Sure, when they go to bed it'll be in a leaky tent with a curtain between them and the next lot of people, and it's going to be beets or something equally awful for breakfast, and Eugene — yeah, not much needs saying there, does it?

But all things considered, it's not so bad, this life.

"This is almost like a proper date, isn't it?" he whispers, as the film launches into some sort of song and montage bit. "Should have held out for this from the beginning. Could've had some suspense, then, about whether you'd get a goodnight kiss."

Eugene shakes his head, and Jack feels him shake with silent laughter. "Movie, Romeo. Watch the movie."

"Take that back," he grumbles, and nudges Eugene in the side with an elbow. Not hard, or anything. Just enough to make his point. "You could still miss out on that kiss, mister."

"Really?" Eugene leans in and presses a slow, open-mouthed kiss to his temple. "Because I had plans for after that kiss I think you'd like..."

Yeah, Jack thinks. This isn't so bad at all.


End file.
